Cushions and prayer books from the Cathedral of All Souls in Asheville, North Carolina, are piled outside the building after being damaged by devastating flood waters that poured through the church and nearby streets on Sept. 28. Photo: Facebook
[Episcopal News Service] As power is being restored across the Episcopal Diocese of Western North Carolina, the Cathedral of All Souls in Asheville, North Carolina, has begun its cleanup after Hurricane Helene. Photos posted to its Facebook page show cushions and prayer books stacked outside, rooms filled with items tossed asunder by floodwaters, and massive plastic tubes running throughout the building to help dry things out, even as mold remains a significant problem.
In the nearly two weeks since the hurricane tore through the Southeast United States, causing destruction from coastal storm surges in Florida to mountainous river flooding and landslides in western North Carolina, Episcopal churches and institutions are picking up the pieces even as some are preparing for another hurricane churning in the Gulf of Mexico.
Among the more dramatic images reported days after the storm were of flood waters pouring through the streets around, and into, the cathedral, located in one of the areas hardest-hit by massive flooding after as much as 30 inches of rain fell on the region.
Cathedral members and other Episcopalians in the Asheville area were able to worship together on Oct. 6 at Trinity Church, which hosted an afternoon service of Holy Communion. Trinity’s rector, the Rev. Scott White, began his sermon with a passage from the Book of Job, one of the lessons appointed for the day – “Shall we receive the good at the hand of God and not the bad?”
He said, “We may never know why suffering is allowed to come our way, but suffering does not mean that God has abandoned us. Just as in this story, God does not abandon Job forever. Can the worst that the world has to throw at us come between us and God? I suspect that the answer to that question depends on the day. And I suspect the answer to that question this week has been strained deeply.”
The Diocese of Western North Carolina has created a special page on their website to provide updates on the status of every church in the diocese, ranging from open and conducting services to those that are worshiping elsewhere because of building damage. Some churches are serving as collection sites for needed supplies while others are distributing them. Some also are providing food or a place to access cell or internet service. One is making its washer and dryer available to those who need clean clothes.
The page also lists recovery and relief efforts in cities across the diocese and what they are providing – food, water, supplies and hot meals. Links to where people can donate money to help those affected also is included.
The diocese also has created a Facebook page, dedicated to relief efforts — Asheville Relief – Episcopal Diocese of Western North Carolina.
A tree felled by the high winds of Hurricane Helene damaged the roof of a cabin at Kanuga conference center. Photo: Courtesy of Kanuga
At Kanuga, a conference, retreat and camp center near Hendersonville, North Carolina, an Oct. 8 update notes that progress is happening but not quickly, as the damage across the 1,400-acre campus is extensive. Photos provided to Episcopal News Service show a tree through a cabin roof and the one-acre Bob Foster Education Garden Center completely underwater. The garden is a total loss and will need to be started again from scratch.
The current priorities are assessing water and wind damage on the Kanuga properties, including the conference center, Camp Kanuga and the Bob Campbell Youth Campus, and then restoration of power, water and phone service.
Next will come removing trees “from, well, everywhere,” the update says, with a priority to clear rooftops and roadways. The expectation is that in most places damage can be repaired.
Kanuga’s president and CEO, Michael Sullivan, said the facility then will transition “to serve as a resource for the greater community, housing nurses, doctors, first responders and others. Plans are also underway to support parish mission trips to the area for work that will last months, if not years.”
In the Episcopal Diocese of Georgia, most of the damage came from trees that fell into church roofs or were tossed by strong winds across church properties.
At St. Bartholomew’s in Savannah, which dates to 1896 and is home to the oldest continuing Black congregation in the diocese, a large pecan tree collapsed the roof of the sanctuary on Sept. 26. Church Insurance had a crane on site Oct. 1 to help remove the tree so cleanup could begin.
A large pecan tree fell on and collapsed the roof of St. Bartholomew’s Church in Savannah, Georgia. This photo was taken from the nave. Photo: Courtesy the Diocese of Georgia
After power was restored, Christ the King in Valdosta was able to have services on Oct. 6, with a blue tarp covering damage to its roof. Its parish hall is serving as a collection site Oct. 7-12 for items needed by local farm workers, including baby items and bottled water.
St. Andrew’s in Douglas also had some damage to the church building, but since the parish hall is intact and has power, it has been a place where people can cool off and recharge their devices. The church also has provided food to anyone in the community who wants to stop by, including an early Thanksgiving dinner on Oct. 6, as it cooked turkeys that had defrosted during its power outage.
Anyone in Augusta in need of a hot meal has been welcome each day at the Byllesby Center, which describes itself as a church without a congregation or walls, focused on the needs in those in the neighborhood of Harrisburg.
Many trees were down at Honey Creek, the diocesan retreat center, but it had help in its cleanup, thanks to the Episcopal Camps and Conference Centers network. Camp St. Christopher in the Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina sent 20 volunteers to help with cleanup on Oct. 3 and 4.
Twelve churches in the Episcopal Diocese of Upper South Carolina suffered moderate or minor damage, and almost every church lost power for a period after the hurricane struck, Jessica St. Clair Smith, the diocese’s director of marketing and communications, told ENS. One of them, All Saints in Beech Island, lost part of its roof, which currently is covered by a tarp.
Members of St. Thaddeus’ in Aiken, South Carolina, used lanterns to see after generator power allowed them to cook hot meals for victims of the hurricane. Photo: Courtesy of the Diocese of Upper South Carolina
Worship continued in most places – either indoors or outdoors – and churches have turned to helping people in need. Several found ways to continue operating their soup kitchens on generator power, St. Clair Smith said, and others provided bag lunches for unhoused neighbors or fall clothing collection for the upcoming cold months.
Churches without power provided a place where people could fill up water jugs, and those with power served hot meals, provided charging stations and ice, or just a place where people could cool off in air conditioning.
The diocese established disaster relief teams that already are at work removing trees from church properties and parishioners’ yards. In the coming weeks, those teams will move to the neighboring Diocese of Western North Carolina to help with debris and damage cleanup.
In the Episcopal Diocese of Southwest Florida, a number of churches on the coast were affected by flooding, but seven were especially hard hit: St. Boniface, Siesta Key; Annunciation, Holmes Beach; St. Matthew’s, St. Petersburg; St. Alban’s, St. Pete Beach; Calvary, Indian Rocks Beach; and St. Thomas, Snell Isle. Bishop Douglas Scharf toured those areas Oct. 3 and 4 with members of the diocesan staff and representatives from Church Insurance to get a better sense for the extent of the damage and ways others could be of help.
He said in a letter to the diocese he would be working with the Diocesan Council “and to allocate additional funding to support these ongoing recovery efforts.” He noted the diocese already has been approved for an initial emergency grant from Episcopal Relief & Development with additional funds coming soon.
But even with these plans in place, the diocese is facing another hurricane – Milton – currently a large Category 4 storm that should make landfall in the morning hours of Oct. 10 south of Tampa. It is expected to bring more damage not only to Florida’s west coast but to almost the entire state before it exits into the Atlantic Ocean still with hurricane-force winds.
To prepare, on Oct. 7 the diocese announced that its annual convention, planned for Oct. 11 and 12, has been postponed, with new dates to be decided later.
“Over the past two years, our diocese has experienced significant impacts from several named tropical systems,” Scharf said in the announcement. “As we face the prospect of yet another storm, I am keenly aware of the physical and emotional toll of these traumatic events. As I write this letter, individuals, families, communities and congregations are still recovering from the devastation caused by Hurricane Helene and Tropical Storm Debby. For those in the southern portion of our diocese, the emotional wounds of Hurricane Ian are not yet fully healed. Many are experiencing the cumulative effects of this succession of life-altering experiences.”
Episcopal Relief & Development has been providing direct help to the Dioceses of Florida, Southwest Florida and Georgia since Helene hit. In each case, the agency has been providing gift cards to help people in impacted regions, and where needed, it has supplied household items as well as water, food, fuel and clothing.
“Our emergency responses are great examples of doing what we can to help people where they currently are,” Katie Mears, senior technical specialist, disaster risk and resilience at Episcopal Relief & Development, said. “As the stages of this disaster progress, people’s needs will change, and we are prepared to accommodate them.”
As of Oct. 8, more than 230 people have died as a result of the Helene, according to ABC News, making the storm the deadliest hurricane to hit the United States mainland since Katrina in 2005.
— Melodie Woerman is an Episcopal News Service freelance reporter based in Kansas.